


Icebreaker

by sxpernova



Category: Original Work
Genre: Blood and Gore, F/F, F/M, Gore, Horror, Original Character Death(s), Original Character(s), Original Female Character(s) - Freeform, POV First Person, POV Original Character, Past Violence, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Relationship(s), Serial Killers, Slasher, Strong Language, Survival Horror, prosthetic leg
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-11
Updated: 2020-01-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:27:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22215556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sxpernova/pseuds/sxpernova
Summary: After a fight with her girlfriend, Amber finds herself stranded in the middle of nowhere at 3 A.M. in the middle of a snowstorm. Meeting a group of teenagers who were on their way up to a cabin, she joins them to find some refuge for the night. When tensions rise and blood starts seeping into the snow, their hideout becomes a prison. Forced to fight for survival until the morning comes and the snow stops, the group must band together to have any hope of escaping this frozen hell.This will be regularly updated.





	Icebreaker

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, welcome to my story! This is an entirely original story and world with its own characters (with the exception of Amber's girlfriend, Winona, who is an OC of a dear friend of mine's whom she lent me for this story), but it's heavily inspired by the likes of many classic slasher films. I've never really read a horror story that plays out like a slasher, so here's my attempt at trying one! A couple things: I'm somewhat new to first-person POV, and I'm also writing this story as I go along, so the plot will be following how the people reading it are responding, so please leave a comment if you'd like to of your opinion or thoughts as the story progresses, it'd help a lot! The character you're reading as is named Amber Davis. I'll be including pictures of them here so that you can imagine their faces more easily.
> 
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> Amber:  
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> Aubrey:  
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> Yara:  
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> Will:  
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> Reynold:  
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> Other than that, enjoy Chapter 1!

“Shit. Shit!” God damn it, this can’t be happening. Of course, I run out of fuel in the middle of a fucking snowstorm. 

“Come on! Are you fucking kidding me?!” I had enough fuel, I swear to fucking god.

Turning the keys in the ignition doesn’t do anything, there’s just the pathetic sputtering of the engine. I crash against the back of my seat, huffing and shutting my eyes. Great. Of course, there’s a snowstorm in Illinois in late October, why wouldn’t there be?

I slip my phone out of my pocket, turning it on and checking the time. 3 A.M. There goes any chance of just waiting it out. My heater’s screwed, and it’s only getting colder the longer I’m on the side of the road. The signal’s not great either, but I might as well try and call Winona.

The phone rings a couple of times, but nothing. Fucking nothing.

“God-ugh, damn it.”

Brushing the condensation away from the window just lets me know that it’s about as bad as I thought. It’s absolute hell out there in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere. Ice sheets are rolling down the street, and the winds swirling around the wind so much I might as well be Dorothy getting a ride out of Kansas. God, I’m so fucked. I should’ve just gone home in the same car as Winona, that fight we had was stupid anyway. I should’ve let it go, she didn’t mean to trigger me like that. It doesn’t even matter now. 

What the hell am I going to do? Looking out the window again, there are no gas stations for miles. I can’t just stay in the car hoping for the storm to pass, which could take hours. Plus, it’s freezing already and I only have a thin ass jacket on. GPS isn’t an option either, which is just great. God, I’d kill for a cell tower right now.

With my head against the headrest of my seat, I’m staring up at the ceiling of my car. This was the shittiest Halloween, which is usually the only damn holiday I even care about. I hope Winona got home safe. She went with her parents, so I’ll just have to hope for the best.

Maybe there’s a cabin or something nearby. Maybe-

A loud car horn cuts my thoughts off, headlights blinding me through my front window. Squinting, I try to make out who’s come to my rescue, but I can only hear voices. Sounds like there’s a couple of them, at least.

“Hello? Hello?!” They’re yelling at my car and I’m reaching into my glove compartment for my stun gun. They could be some psychos looking to pick people off that are stuck on the road, or-

“HEY!” I jump in my seat, spinning to a shadow banging on my driver-side window, shivering in the cold. “CAN YOU HELP US?!” It yells. The voice sounds like a girl, and the silhouette’s small, so she can’t be that much of a threat.

“Who else is with you?!” I yell back through my window, looking over my shoulder through the passenger window. My hand still gripping the glove compartment, my head switching between my backseat doors and the passenger side door. They’re are all still locked. Good.

“Just me, my boyfriend and two others. Please, our car’s dead!”

Facing her again, I finally roll down my window. Snow hits me in the face almost immediately, the chill rushing into my car and removing any warmth there was left. “Well, mine is too!” I yell over the wind, and the hope drains from her face. Her cheeks are flushed from the cold and she’s shivering, her arms wrapped around her body tightly to try and keep herself warm.

“Well, shit!” She yells back, sighing before looking to the car she came from and shaking her head. Her shoulders slump a bit and she looks back at me pleadingly, seemingly hoping I have some surprise solution in my back pocket. 

“Look, if we all stick together and try to find a place to stay, we’ll have a better chance of finding somewhere warm,” I say to her. Normally, I wouldn’t trust some random girl this quickly, but considering the circumstances, she’s the best chance I’ve got. Well, her and her friends.

“Uh, okay-hold on, let me talk to the others!” She yells to me before walking out of sight and back towards the blinding headlights. 

Now that my eyes have adjusted a bit, I can make out some of the shapes. There’s what looks like a guy, a broad-shouldered shadow that she rushes up to. Behind them are two more people, just like she said. One of them’s a larger and rounder figure, and one’s about the same size as the teen that’d approached me. The girl that talked to me seems to be talking to the more masculine silhouette. She turns and starts walking back to my window.

She leans in slightly, smiling at me. “They all said that’s a good idea! Come with us!” She says.

“I’ll be right out!” I yell and she nods, jogging back over to other people that are stuck in this freezing hell with us. Reaching back into the glove compartment, I grab my switchblade and taser too, shoving all of these into a bag. You never know.

The door opens and the sudden change in temperature makes my breath hitch for a second. Shit, it must be below zero at this point. Squinting once more through the bright yellow beams, the teens are waving their hands to tell me to come over. Hugging my arms, I make my way over to them and get greeted by the guy.

“Hey, jesus. Aubrey told us your car’s dead too?” He asks. He’s tall, way taller than Aubrey. Dark hair, dark eyes and tan skin. He looks fit. Aubrey, in comparison, is at least a head and a half shorter than him. She’s a skinny redhead with freckles, and she’s paler than him.

“Uh, yeah. Fuel ran out,” I say, gesturing towards the car with one of my hands.

“Shit out of luck. Well, our car died, so I guess we’re all stuck in this together.” He says, chuckling nervously.

“Guess you could say that. Do you have jumper cables? You could use my car’s battery.”

“Nope. We, uh… threw those out to fit in some kegs.”

“Smart.”

“We didn’t think we were gonna get stranded in the middle of a snowstorm,” He says defensively, looking almost sheepish after my sarcastic reply.

“Sorry, but who the hell are you?” One of them asks.

“Amber. Was on my way home from a Halloween thing,” I explain, looking back at him. He’s dark-skinned, his hair’s way longer and in dreads, I think, but it’s hard to tell in the dark. He’s about as tall as the other guy. “And you are… ?” I ask back, raising a brow at him.

“Reynold. This is Yara,” He says with a tilt of his head toward the other girl, who comes up to his shoulder. She’s fit, whereas Reynold’s a bit on the pudgier side. Her skin’s a light brown, so light it could almost just be a tan.

Nodding to them in acknowledgment, my attention turns back to the man in front of me as he says, “My name’s Will, by the way. Sorry, I didn’t introduce myself.”

“I’d say it’s nice to meet you, but… well, you know,” Aubrey chimes in, smiling weakly at me. 

Chuckling softly, I nod. “Yeah, I get it. Look, do any of you know this area well? Is there a gas station or something we can hide in? We can’t stay out here.”

“We were actually on our way to our cabin. It’s in the woods, we could walk to it from here. I know where it is,” Yara says from behind everyone, all of our heads swiveling to look at her.

“We’re in the middle of a fucking blizzard, Yara. How the hell are you gonna follow the trail? We can barely even see it in the day,” Reynold says cynically, rolling his eyes at Yara.

“There are lights on the path. After the storm last year, my dad and I went and set them up, with permission from the people we’re renting it from, of course. If we can find the lights we can just follow them to the cabin,” She says, smiling smugly back at him. 

He sighs, shrugging before saying, “Fine. Guess it’s our best shot.”

“Lead the way,” Will says, moving his arms in front of him as he steps aside to let Yara move past. She steps up, looking over her shoulder and nodding. “Here we go.”

The four of them are ahead of me with Yara leading the way. It’s pitch dark, and with the cars’ headlights so far away now, our phone flashlights are the only way we’re not tripping over each other.

The wind keeps picking up the more we walk. By now we’re about fifteen minutes away from the cars, but it might as well be hours. If we turn back we’re gonna get lost almost for sure, since none of us thought to leave a trail of bread-crumbs, not that that would’ve helped in this situation anyways. We’ve been walking straight down the road when Yara finally makes a left, stepping off of the road and into the trees.

“Yara, you sure you know where we’re going?!” Will yells over the wind and snow as we trudge forward.

“Yeah! There should be a creek up here, the lights are just past that!” I can barely hear her response over all of the noise, but she sounds confident. She’s our best bet right now, so I’m just gonna have to trust her.

“This isn’t how I was planning to spend Halloween!” Aubrey yells over her shoulder to me, turning to laugh softly.

“Me either! Guess we got our tricks for tonight!” I yell back, grunting with the effort of pulling my foot out of the snow after having accidentally stepped too hard and sunk into it. Shining my flashlight around the woods, it’s definitely creepy enough for Halloween. Winona’s gonna have a big “I told you so” moment tomorrow when I see her. I guess I’ll deserve it.

The sound of rushing water confirms Yara’s credibility, but it also starts making me breathe heavier. Bodies of water aren’t exactly an ideal location for me. I’m gonna have to cross it if I want to get into the lodge, and it’s just some water. It can’t be that bad, right?

“There’s a bridge here! Stay away from the water, don’t fall in!”

“Really? I was kind of feeling a swim!” Will yells in reply.

“Unless you wanna set the world record for hypothermia, don’t go anywhere near it!” Reynold yells, a second to Yara’s warning.

“The world’s fastest record for hypothermia isn’t a thing. You can’t record when you get hypothermia,” Yara replies quickly.

“Well, I’m sorry Ms. 4.0 GPA! My bad!” Reynold bites back, his hands held out with his palms splayed open to signal his sarcasm.

“Uh, guys, I’m not too good with water,” My hands are having a hard time keeping the phone still. Fuck, fuck, fuck. It’s just some fucking water, come on, snap out of it.

“You need some help?” Reynold yells back to me, stopping and looking at me from the front of the group, over the top of his glasses. 

“I just need a second, go on ahead.” That’s not a complete lie, minus the fact that I’m gonna need more than a second, but I can’t hold up the entire group because of my stupid ass fear of fucking water.

“You guys go ahead, I’ll stay back with Amber,” Aubrey yells, kissing Will before slipping away from him with a nod to assure him before he, Reynold and Yara head over the bridge.

By this point, I need to ball my hands into fists and I’m conscious of my breathing. I just gotta slow down my heart rate. Breath in. Breathe out. Come on, Amber.

“You alright? What’s going on?” Aubrey says as she approaches me, her arms wrapped around herself, one of them slightly angled as so to shine her flashlight on me. She’s shivering, and she’s also seriously nice to say back with me. If I could stop losing my mind, I’d say thank you.

“Y-yeah, I just… I have a thing with rushing water. Or large things of water in general. It’s a long story.” 

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t worry about it,” She says, alternating between looking at me and over her shoulder to watch the others cross. Her eyes lock back on me as she says, “I’ll walk with you. Just hold on to me, and we’ll make it over together, alright? I promise it’s safe, it’s not one of those rickety old bridges or anything. It’s like, actually built well.”

“You should be in advertising, that was convincing,” I say sarcastically, chuckling nervously. My heart’s moving way too fast for me to keep up. I feel like I’m gonna explode, but I say, “Okay,” anyways.

Aubrey hooks an arm around my shoulder, the other hand resting on my arm, and we make our way slowly towards the bridge. Her phone lights it up so that I can see it, and she’s right, it’s not hanging off of two tenuous ropes that look like they could barely hold together some third-grader’s friendship bracelet. It’s built with thick pieces of wood, and the sides are pretty high up. It’d be impossible to fall over. Does that calm me down, though? Weirdly not.

“Ready?” She asks, smiling reassuringly at me and nodding, almost as if answering her own question will make me more inclined to say ‘yes.’ I say it anyway, since I don’t really have any other choice.

“Let’s do it.” She says, nodding with determination and taking a deep breath in. She was kind of a badass. Note to self, maybe stay in contact with Aubrey after this. Winona would love her. 

We take our first step onto the bridge, and there’s only the smallest creak. That’s a good sign. What’s not a good sign is that the water is so loud, it feels like it’s everywhere. All I can keep fucking thinking about is the feeling of falling in, of the seatbelt wrapped around me and of him next to me. The way everything went dark, and how it stayed dark until Winona got me out. How-

“Hey, hey, Amber? Could you just-you know, loosen your grip a bit?” Aubrey breaks in, wincing a bit which makes me look down before quickly relaxing my hands a bit, gasping out of surprise. 

“Shit, yeah, sorry,” I say, noticing how shaky my voice is. 

She shakes her head, “It’s okay.”

We inch our way across, and after a couple of minutes, we’re finally back on land and off of that bridge.

“We made it!” Aubrey says cheerfully, clapping her hands together and smiling at me.

“Yeah, yeah we did,” I chuckle, smiling back at her and nodding. “Hey, thanks for that, by the way. You didn’t have to.”

“Don’t sweat it. I get it, I have this weird thing with butterflies.”

“Butterflies?”

“Long story.” Her smile grows, winking at me because she’d repeated my line to her.

“Nice one.”

“Thanks! Let’s get back to the others, hopefully, Yara and Reynold haven’t killed each other by now,” She says, nodding her head in the direction of where the rest of the group had gone.

Following her, I’m realizing how eerily similar these woods are to the ones I drove through when I was getting away from Thomas. I’ve gotta stop thinking about that.

“So, how do you all know each other?” I ask, trying to make some conversation while we walk.

“Oh! We all go to school together, although I think you can already guess that. Will and I met freshman year. He plays football and I was cheerleading at a game of his, so he asked me out and… well, the rest is history. I knew Yara because I was on the student council with her, and I met Reynold through her. The two of them grew up together, apparently,” She answers, periodically looking back at me in-between sentences. Whether it’s to make sure I’m okay or to let me know she’s talking to me, I’m not sure.

“What year are you all?”

“Senior year. It’s a big celebration thing.”

After about five minutes of walking, we hear a voice call out from ahead of us. “Aubrey! Amber! Over here!” It sounds like Will.

“Looks like they got to the lodge,” I say, and Aubrey replies with a, “Yeah. Let’s hope it’s warmer than it is out here.”

Marching up the slope leading to the lodge, we step onto a path lined by some dim but visible lights, and looking down it the lodge is at the end. It’s fucking massive. It’s two stories and it’s pretty wide too, about… two semi-trucks lined end to end. The lamps are those electric ones that you stick into the grass, the white light illuminating the path.

“How loaded is your friend?” I ask with a raised brow to Aubrey.

“She’s pretty loaded.”

Will’s waving at us, his arms flailing to get out attention from down the path, and we make our way over to him.

As we approach, a bright light flickers, flashing on us from above. It’s coming from something mounted on the roof of the lodge, It must be a motion sensor light. Aubrey speeds up and Will walks forward, hugging her. “I was starting to get worried, you guys were taking a while,” He says, looking at Aubrey and then at me, seemingly checking to see if we’d gotten here without a scratch.

“We’re fine. Had some girl bonding time,” Aubrey said with a smile to me over her shoulder and then a kiss to Will.

“Where’re Yara and Reynold?” I ask, chiming in. They break their kiss, and Will turns to look inside and then to me before replying with, “They’re inside. The fire’s lit up, so you can warm up in there.”

“Thanks,” With a nod, I slip by the two of them and inside, shutting the door behind me. The instant the door shuts it’s almost instantly warmer, the cold trapped outside now. Deep breath. In. Out.

Slipping out of my coat, I hang it on the rack and walk inside, looking around. Again, it’s massive. The ceiling is so high up I can’t see the top of it clearly because of the shadows covering it. The living room’s the size of Winona and my’s entire apartment and then some, and the dining room is about the size of a modest Mcdonald’s. There’s a fireplace burning bright in the living room, which is to my right, and the kitchen to my left has some kick-ass smell coming out of it that reminds me of pie. God, I could go for some pie.

It looks like something straight out of a travel brochure, and they’ve even got it Halloween-ready, with some spooky skeletons by the fireplace with fake spiders littered on the coffee table in front of it. Hot cocoa’s put out on the table too, and Yara’s got a head start on it.

“You made it! The fire’s hot, come join us,” A voice says from the right, my head turning to look at Yara.

“Thought you and Aubrey froze to death for a second there,” Reynold chimes in from his place on the sofa in front of the fire, looking over his shoulder at me.

“Yeah, well, luckily we didn’t.” Sitting down by Yara, she grabs a cup from a small tray by her armrest, pouring me something hot.

“It’s hot tea. I put some honey in there because I like it sweet, but if you don’t like that then… don’t drink it, I guess?” She says, holding out the cup to me. Okay, well, she’s definitely one to cut to the chase.

“I’ll take it. Thanks. Plus, I like my stuff sweet anyways,” My hands take the cup from her, and the warmth immediately brings some blood back to my fingertips. It smells great too, kind of like citrus.

“So what the hell were you doing driving around at 3 A.M. anyway?” Reynold asks, his brow raised and his body leaned forward towards me. Turning to him, I’m not really sure if I wanna tell him the whole thing. It’s a hell of a party killer to mention that you had some shitty fight with your girlfriend which is how you wound up on a road out of gas in the middle of nowhere.

“Was trying to drive home by myself after an argument with my girlfriend. You can guess how well that went,” I reply.

He laughs a bit, shaking his head. “Dumbass.”

“Says the guy who took out his jumper cables to put in kegs instead,” Yara cuts in, narrowing her eyes and rolling them as she says it.

“Hey, that was Will’s idea!” He objects, throwing up his hands in mock surrender.

“How about you guys? What’re you all doing up here?” I ask, looking between the two of them.

‘Graduation party. Only one semester left and then we’re off to college. Are you in college?” Yara asks.

“No, I graduated a while back.”

“Damn, you’re, what, 22 then?”

“No, I’m 20. Guess I was a ‘gifted’ kid.”

“You’re one of THOSE,” Reynold says, leaning back into the sofa cushions.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I ask, and he just shrugs.

“Ignore him,” Yara says with another roll of her eyes.

The loud slam of the door announces Will and Aubrey’s return, both of them slipping off their jackets before walking over to us with big smiles.

“Now that we’re finally here… let’s get this party started!” Will cheers, beaming at everyone.

Aubrey settles down next to Reynold and looks back to Will before looking over to me and asking, “Do you drink?”

“Yeah, but I think I’ll go ahead and sit this one out. You guys have fun.”

“Oh come on, you gotta drink some,” Will says, looking at me pleadingly.

Reynold cuts in before I can reply, saying, “Hey man, if she doesn’t wanna just leave it,” He says, checking him. With a sigh, Will nods. “Yeah, alright. Sorry.”

Yara clears her throat to keep the conversation moving. “Okay, but we have to keep it down. The owners of this cabin set a curfew of like 10 P.M., so we’re not even supposed to have our lights on. If we get a complaint from any of the other cabins, we’re fucked.”

“Wait, there are more?” I ask, surprised.

“Yeah, the old lady that let us rent this out for the night owns, like, three. We have neighbors on both sides of us, you just didn’t see them between all the trees and snow.” She says.

“Jesus, how rich is she?”

“Filthy rich. No idea how, though. Rumors say she marries guys who are about to die, croak, kick the bucket so that she can get their wills. Personally, I think she’s just a savvy businesswoman, but Reynold likes the femme fatale thing,” Yara explains as she sets a ton of cups out across the coffee table that sits right in in the middle of the furniture.

“Huh. That’s… interesting.”

“Reynold. Reynold. Reynold!” Yara raises her voice, trying to get his attention. He’d been staring at me, his eyes on my leg. “Why are you being a creep?” She asks, glaring at him. He looks between me and her before saying, “No, that’s not-sorry, I just noticed the, you know-never mind.”

He’s talking about my prosthetic leg, and as he says it I see Yara turning to look at it too, her eyes widening. Aubrey and Will follow, both of them looking a bit shocked before looking away. I always get that reaction, people always need to do a double-check and then take a minute to process.

“It’s fine. I’m used to it.” I say, waving my hand dismissively to reassure them that I wasn’t offended.

“How’d it happen?” Will asks before Aubrey glares at him and whispers, “You can’t just ask her that!”

“It’s fine, Aubrey. It happened in an accident. That’s all you need to know.” I’m not telling them more than that. The instant people know what happened they start pulling the whole pity thing, and I don’t want or need that shit. They don't need to hear my sob story.

“Yeah. Totally get that. Sorry.” Will says, backing off.

“You guys get your party started. I’m gonna try to get some sleep. Have fun.” Standing up, I walk away from the living room and up the stairs, not looking back at them. I can feel the staring even without looking. It's expected but still unwelcome, and it's just pissing me off even more.

The cold isn’t great for my prosthetic leg. These gel liners are doing their job of keeping me warm, but damn if they aren't uncomfortable.

Reaching the top of the stairs, I flick on the light switch and look down the long hallway. There are about four rooms, two per side of the hallway. The rooms are spaced out from each other, which makes the hallway way longer than it needs to be. There’s a small light on the ceiling, about seven leading all the way down the hallway above my head.

Before picking a room, I walk down the hallway and past the rooms to check out the end of it. Ever since Thomas, I’ve gained this habit of making an escape plan for everywhere I go. Winona thinks it’s a bit weird that I know the fastest route out of all of our favorite restaurants, but it’s better safe than sorry. The hallway leads to a dead-end, the only way out being a window that I could barely fit out of and I don’t think a two-story jump in this weather’s gonna end well for anyone. Other than that, there’s a table with a red landline a painting hanging above. It’s some cheap knockoff of the Screamer. Unfortunately for me, no exit door or fire escape.

I pick the room closest to the stairs, the first room on the left.

Opening the door, the first thing I notice is that the room’s big as hell, just like everything else in the lodge. It’s about half of the size of the whole damn living room. It looks like a hotel room, with the first thing on my left being a door to what is probably the bathroom. Past that, there’s a king-sized bed with pillows arranged neatly under the blanket. On either side of the bed are two small dressers, a lamp on each one with colored filters around them so that the whole room’s washed in blue. A small TV’s on a shelf in front of the bed, and there’s a giant floor to ceiling window on the far side. The whole thing feels like a five-star hotel. The lamps are already on, but I guess the owners could’ve had this whole place prepared for the group's arrival. 

Some pop music starts coming from downstairs as I hear Will and Yara burst into laughter. The walls must not be as thick as I thought.

There’s a massive window on the wall farthest from my room’s door that looks out onto the road where we came from. I can see the woods from here, it’s nice and peaceful. Maybe this won’t be so bad after all. The dim lights lining the path to the lodge are too dim to light anything up from where I’m standing, so it’s still nearly pitch black. Yara should really replace those with something brighter.

Turning around, I’m about to get into bed when suddenly a bright white light hits me from behind. Spinning back around and looking out my window again, the woods are suddenly illuminated, the motion sensor light flashing. I hear screaming coming from downstairs, and my hands come up to cover my mouth, my eyes widening as I feel vomit rushing up my throat.

There’s a dead body on the path.


End file.
